Shenmue II - Behind the Mic

[Yama]

Shenmue Dojo has been in contact with various voice actors from Shenmue II's English release. One voice actor in particular had a lot to say regarding the quality of the voices and just why some of them were as bad as they were. As per requested, his name will be listed as anonymous, though Shenmue Dojo can fully attest to his role in the title.

Read Shenmue II - Behind the Mic here.

[Spokane]

That helps explain some stuff.

[Yama]

$70 million and they couldn't even hire an old man to do some voice acting, they just had this poor sap freestyle along the way? It's comical really.

[Peter]

great job on finally getting the article up! B very interesting read, it doesnt sound like the guy enjoyed himself. Explains a lot

[Crimson Ryan]

Is it the old man who plays Lucky Hit?

[Dorian]

$70 million and they couldn't even hire an old man to do some voice acting, they just had this poor sap freestyle along the way? It's comical really.

45 million.

This doesn't surprise me at all. In fact, the guy described exactly what I have imagined about English voice acting sessions for Xbox's Shemmue II....

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxlmvhcs9JM[/youtube]

[silversons100thaccount]

Pretty sure he's talking about the part around the 37 minute mark here where Ryo enters the warehouse with the gang members. Always thought that was a weird segment.

"At first, I and a few other guys recorded gang scenes. A group of gang members chatting. We weren't instructed to talk about anything specific. But we seemed to all chat about gang-related topics, as best we could imagine."


[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yygjWIc8Gf4[/youtube]


If this is how Sega treated the Xbox port of the game........:(. Makes me wonder if we'll ever seen Shenmue 3.

[shengoro86]

interesting how what he describes is exactly how i felt the voice acting became so bad.

[we420]

im guessing Yu Suzuki might make shenmue 3 with english subs like yakuza

[Dorian]

After what has happened in Japan, SIII is even further away. I guess we shouldn't get our hopes up, at least not this year.

[Peter]

im guessing Yu Suzuki might make shenmue 3 with english subs like yakuza

This would be better. I would love an original version of Shenmue in Japanese, with English subs.

After what has happened in Japan, SIII is even further away. I guess we shouldn't get our hopes up, at least not this year.

Yea, i would say Shenmue III would be around 5 years away, and within that time Shenmue Gail will have seen a western release and quite possibly a HD version of both Shenmue and Shenmue II will have been released either as DLC or a hard DC collection. In fact, a part of me wouldnt mind waiting until 2019, and celebrate the 20th anniversary of Shenmue with its finale. I have no doubt that by 2019 we will have concluded the Shenmue story.

[Axm]

Very interesting read. And really what id thought had gone on aswell. The fact that they needed so many different voices made it into a quick rush job. But in that, with the budget that they should of had, they should have easily been able to cast a few old guys. Considering it seems like all the voice work was done in Japan, then I guess thats why. But it seems like they could have done abit of easy recruiting if they spent the time trying.

When I was in Japan I actually did some free lance TV work. A show and a commercial. Easy money. I dont know why they couldnt grab more authentic voices like what happened to me when I was simply grabbed off the street.

[Spokane]

Very interesting read. And really what id thought had gone on aswell. The fact that they needed so many different voices made it into a quick rush job. But in that, with the budget that they should of had, they should have easily been able to cast a few old guys. Considering it seems like all the voice work was done in Japan, then I guess thats why. But it seems like they could have done abit of easy recruiting if they spent the time trying.

When I was in Japan I actually did some free lance TV work. A show and a commercial. Easy money. I dont know why they couldnt grab more authentic voices like what happened to me when I was simply grabbed off the street.

Could you share your freelance work with us?

I am interested now.

[Schiff]

awesome feature! Good job!

[mue 26]

Thanks, Funny little read. Though I was hoping we might find out exactly what accent Toms voice actor was going for. Was he doing a Japanese-english accent? maybe an Indian -English? Really bad jamaican patois? Personally I think he was going for the accent of an Indian doing an impression of a Japanese who is doing a bad Jamaican patois. Either way the mans a genius,I would love an interview from him.
For a while I actually thought all the camp voice acting in Shenmue was deliberate artistic decision, I thought they wanted the semi camp tone, clearly I was wrong.